Mrs. Gillespie’s Book of the Week – Peanut

Have you ever told a lie that you thought was no big deal? It was just a little story to make things easier. No one was hurt by it. But then it started to creep into other parts of your life and you had to remember to hold all of the pieces of that little lie together and hope no one caught you?

This is the premise of the graphic novel Peanut by Ayun Halliday and Paul Hoppe. Sadie is starting at a new high school. Looking for a conversation starter, she decides to tell people about her peanut allergy. She even writes about it for one of her classes. The only problem. Sadie doesn’t have a peanut allergy. But now she has to remember all of the time to act as if she does.

The illustrations in this book are wonderful and the story is just great. I felt really anxious for Sadie as things started to unravel for her (there’s lots of avoiding the school nurse who wants to know why she hasn’t dropped off medical forms and an epi-pen…she manages to lie her way out of that, briefly). This was probably one of my favorite books that I read this summer.